James Kirkup is The Telegraph's Executive Editor (Politics). He was previously the Telegraph's Political Editor and has worked at Westminster since 2001.

MPs' Expenses: Computer says No

By means I am, for reasons of courtesy, not at liberty to disclose, I have recently become acquainted with the new website MPs must now use to claim expenses.

The system and its operators, IPSA, have made a lot of MPs jolly cross in recent days. Members grumble that it’s cumbersome and bureaucratic and makes it hard for to get their money back for travel etc.

Well, from what I’ve seen, the website itself isn’t too different to many of those used by major companies to handle their expenses, including my own dear employers. To be sure, using these systems can be a bit fiddly. In that, MPs are now experiencing the same frustrations as the rest of us.

Well, most MPs are. Around 70 of them have still not attended an IPSA training session to be issued with passwords, secure IDs etc that will allow them to start claiming. They include the Rt Hon member for Whitney, I understand. Presumably he has other things on his mind at the moment.

(On another front, a big grievance of MPs remains unanswered: no expenses payments made until June 23, leaving many out of pocket until then. IPSA says it offers loans and advances in the meantime, but few MPs I know are mollified by that.)

Anyway, the IPSA claims site does have some unique features.

Before submitting claims, MPs have to click to confirm that they are legitimate claims and their snouts are not in the trough.

More amusingly, it features a button marked “check.” If you click it, it will assess your claims against the rulebook. If it finds a clear breach – say, over-claiming for daily subsistence – it will automatically reject the claim and explain why.